Inside Asian Gaming

September 2010 | INSIDE ASIAN GAMING 7 Shuffle Master of the Rapid suite of games, Shuffle Master had to do plenty of hard work behind the scenes to put itself in that winning position. The company applied for a Singapore licence as a gaming equipment supplier and for certification for its Rapid suite of products well in advanceof the sales dealswith the casinos.That’s because Singapore’s Casino Regulatory Authority has some of the most stringent probity checks on gaming suppliers and some of the most exacting technical standards for individual gaming products anywhere in the world. A supplier can have a market-leading product but without CRA approval you can’t crack Singapore, as some rival manufacturers have found to their cost. Welcome to the family Spurred by the success of the Rapid range in Singapore, the Stargames-based electronic platforms and content are now being aggressively developed for the Asia Pacific market. Stargames’ focus on slots and electronic table games came about because it was set up to serve the predominantly pub- and club-basedmarkets in Australia. The fully automated multi-terminal Vegas Star offers multiple game options, including: Blackjack; Dragon Bonus Baccarat; Roulette; Sic Bo; Ultimate Baccarat; and Progressive Jackpot Baccarat™. Vegas Star was developed as an automated product because live dealers are not permitted in the pubs and clubs Down Under. The move to bind Stargames firmly into the Shuffle Master family meant organisational and cultural changes for the two units. The Stargames name has been retained as the slot product brand, but the business unit has been renamed Shuffle Master Australasia. The marketing, research and development functions formerly spread across two distinct units have now become part of a true family effort. In addition to achieving great success, Shuffle Master has faced some tough challenges this year. Themuch-respected CEOTimParrott stepped down from his post in April due to illness, and company Chairman Phillip Peckmanmoved to the role of interimCEO. Sadly Mr Parrott died the following month. In mid-August Shuffle Master also experienced organisational changes in its Macau office, with Andrew Macaulay, Executive Vice President – Asia, leaving the company. New sales team Now Shuffle Master is focused on creating a new sales team in Asia for its already market proven catalogue of table and electronic products. “The question is how big will the take up of the electronic product range be in Macau?” says Simon Ashley, the man overseeing the creation of that new team. “With the cap on the number of live tables in Macau until the end of 2012, there’s clearly an opportunity in that market for sales of ETGs,” states Mr Ashley. “I think in order to develop the consumer appeal, there will have to be some marketing development in that space by the Macau operators–whether it’s tournaments, whether it’s side bets or progressives. Such marketing could involve ETGs linked locally or over a wide area network. Those methods are very familiar in the slot space, but haven’t really been explored in the ETG market in Macau,” he adds. “The big unanswered question in the Macaumarket I think is how electronic baccarat will develop, given the fact players here so love the live dealer game and like squeezing the cards. In addition to the increased speed of play, the answer may lie in baccarat progressives and possibly initially in local area links within a property.” Slot strategy In the slots segment, Shuffle Master has four key aims in Asia Pacific: re-establishing recognition of the Stargames brand in the regional market; getting traction in the individual markets that make up the region; creating strong and varied content for those national markets, and then leveraging all those elements off each other. “We’re now in the process of feeding all our Australian slot content through to our Asian markets. As well as Macau, we’re also in the process of getting approvals in Singapore, and putting our new content in Malaysia. We’ll be doing the same in the Philippines,” says Simon Ashley. “The first games started to come through to Asianmarkets inMay and June, just before G2E Asia. We now have our first slot catalogue out for Asia Pacific, and we will be looking to put about 20 games per year through each of the Asian markets. “Do I expect all of the games to work? Probably not. Some may get churned out, but there will probably be two or three in each release that perform very well,” predicts Mr Ashley. “In the past we had slot product that workedwell, but not enough content. Now we have that content, and operators are keen to talk to us,” says Ken Jolly. ‘Nothing pleases me more than when operators come to me or Ken and say: “What other games have you got? What can we have next? That means we’re on the right track,” adds Mr Ashley. Rapidly gaining popularity—Shuffle Master’s Rapid Roulette Shuffle Master’s Vegas Star